Where the Bunny Made Its Home
by Tsinoitulover
Summary: "Bears were the minus spirits. Bears were the bad guys. Ichigo was not a bear. ...Besides, she always took extra, special care whenever drawing the bunnies." In the back of his mind, Ichigo wondered about where Rukia's fascination with rabbits and the like had come from. He was more concerned with, however, why he had to suffer at the hands of her bunny fixation.


**Disclaimer:** Bleach is not mine.

* * *

~Where the Bunny Made Its Home~

It was strange, of course. When the shinigami had first plopped out a sketchpad of cartoon drawings, settling down like some primary school teacher for story-time. God, Ichigo had thought, plus and minus spirits?-even the names sounded kiddish.

During that time Ichigo was wondering if all shinigami were a bit loopy in the head like her. But, after experiencing some rather frightening introductions to various hair-accessorized, tattoo fanatical, goat-mimicking-

Ichigo silently appreciated Rukia's sub-irregular obsessions and quirks.

It was when she pummeled the pet mascot of the school visitors that he began to slightly worry.

Well, not pummeled…

She had been frantically trying to pull off the poor things, er, antlers, forgetting all kinds of shinigami regulations and screaming for help to stop the infectious hollow's claws from eating the poor bunny from inside out. All the while, Ichigo had been regretting giving in to her demand to see how 'in high heavens these human battles of skill and strength involved one little ball of black and white coloring.'

Of course she didn't believe him when he said that it was normal for some rabbits to have extra antler things on their heads. She had been miffed at having to be escorted out by the referees-turned-security-guards, but she only gave a half hearted kick to the boy's shins before walking away, muttering about the impossibility of "jackalopes" (Okay, there really _weren't_ such a thing as rabbits with antlers; Ichigo regretted that joke) and hissing dark curses onto black and white balls of wickedness.

They had been suspended from attending any school games for the rest of the semester, but Ichigo didn't mind that as much as when Rukia had kidnapped and completely dissected Karin's soccer ball. The replacement and the replacement after _that_ came out of _his_ pocket, damn shinigami.

* * *

"Now, see, look, you're leaking energy everywhere-"

"-Why am I always a bear!"

Ichigo had learned several things in the strange land of Rukia lectures and accompanying drawings.

Bears were the minus spirits. Bears were the bad guys. Ichigo was not a bear.

…Besides, she always took extra, special care whenever drawing the bunnies.

Rukia paused, her face still composed in the most serious of lectures.

"Fool, you're not a rabbit." She stated simply.

At times, Ichigo would get exasperated and gripe over why Rukia liked rabbits so much. But she would always answer with a wordless huff and then something or another would always come up, and the question would never be truly answered.

Ichigo always figured though, ruthless shinigami-she devil or not, girls were girls. And girls tended to go for the 'ootsie-cutsie' stuff. Well…maybe not girls like Tatsuki. But Tatsuki-like girls didn't really count as "girly-girls" in the first place. Anyway, bunnies automatically fell into the cute section, and it was expected really, for Rukia to choose to fawn over those stinky fur balls with floppy ears. He kept the latter to himself after she had graciously whapped him upside the head for that comment.

But it wasn't just the rabbits that were in her evil clutches. Oh no, various creatures of woodlands did not escape her grasp. Rabbits were only the supreme rulers in her mind. There were also the bears, despite their villainous roles in her cartoons, and sometimes the raccoons. Kon, and his stuffed-lion form, unfortunately, did not fit in Rukia's category of the most worthy sacred creatures. Ichigo was secretly pleased with this fact.

Nevertheless, Ichigo got a double whopping after pointing out that real bears, not the cuddly teddy bears she liked to draw, had big, nasty claws and teeth and wouldn't think twice about swiping her face off and that raccoons were vicious little gremlins that loved to knock over your trash cans and wreak havoc.

"Heh, no wonder you love those stupid fur balls, you're practically related to them."

He was careful not to word such things since then. She had aimed higher than his shins that day.

He had rued the day, though, that Rukia got to take home the class pet. The adorable, look at me I wiggle my nose ever so cutely, Koko the rabbit. He'd been dreading it. All the time. The last time he had to take Koko home was tolerable, Yuzu had mainly taken charge and even Karin had dropped the tough girl act and smiled and petted loveable Koko. But now, now it was horrible. After he took care of Koko, it was Rukia's turn next.

Damn shinigami stuck her hand up faster in the air than the teacher could blink and pleaded to bump up her turn after his. That sneaky little...

-Of course, since said rabid rabbit fan lived with him, they had Koko for four weeks instead of two.

Rukia was positively thrilled.

Thrilled enough that she didn't even punish him with any physical means. In retrospect, he had enjoyed that break, but…but the damn rabbit got all the attention. And when the hollow for the day popped up, Rukia actually had the nerve to protect the little pest first. If Ichigo cared to admit it, he was a little hurt by the whole thing. Rukia, on the other hand, had not seemed that concerned.

"I have determined that you've grown much stronger, Ichigo, and have continued to do so. You do not need as much assistance now."

Ichigo, her once-in-a-blue-moon compliment completely flying over his head, was not as laid back and proceeded to state so with theatric hand motions and his best Rukia impersonation.

"What the-! What are-? Damn it! What happened to 'Run away Ichigo!' and 'Save yourself'?"

He almost made the mistake of pinning a cliché ultimatum on her-one involving himself, Koko, and a very high cliff-but he bit down on his tongue. Sure, there was zero question with the great bunny figure that was _the_ Chappy. That floppy stinkball was a god in her eyes. But now..any rabbit? Damn...

But no matter the snide comments about Koko or any of her animal preferences, it was always met with the routine, albeit sometimes particularly painful, kick or punch or hit with the closest object on hand. Rukia's improvisation with seemingly harmless objects was downright scary.

No, it all came to a head when Ichigo, stressed and tired from school exams and multiple Hollow attacks in one day, came home to a dirty rabbit cage plus dirty rabbit.

And he, kind of, sort of, didn't take much care. Well, it wiggled and _squeaked_ and just wouldn't stay still in the water and finally it squirmed out of his hands-and it honestly took a while to blindly grab it underwater with all the bubbles in the way ok?

But Rukia was _furious_.

All right, considering Ichigo's easily misinterpret-able scowl and the miserable rabbit dangling upside-down in his grasp, he could see how conclusions could be jumped to.

Rukia looked at Ichigo's dripping and shivering state with zero to negative numbers of pity and, instead, held the half drowned rabbit close to her chest. Ichigo wondered if there was some shinigami power that enabled midgets to suddenly grow twenty meters, because she was staring down at him with a dark, dark look.

Ichigo was man enough to admit when certain things made him want to pee his pants.

And he waited for the blows to come. He waited for her to brutally slaughter him, perhaps drown him like he **_accidently _**_(_he swears, really) did with the rabbit, take his soul and send him to soul society where she would kill him there, and then hunt down and kill his reincarnation and so on.

But of all possible murder possibilities and surprises, she merely glared. A chilling glare filled with doom before stalking away with the bunny in hand. The death aura around her continued to spike into his essence long after she was away.

Afterwards, he walked in small tiptoes around her, prepared for inevitable death, living in constant strain. But later, Ichigo found out what Rukia had done instead.

His image had been demoted from bear to chipmunk.

At first, he was a bit confused, but Rukia seemed to have had taken things in stride, seemingly have forgiven him by satisfying her blood thirst via bear to chipmunk demotion.

And it was okay for a while, it was perfectly dandy actually. Heck, Ichigo would settle as some freaky octopus-butterfly if it meant one less bone breakage in his legs. Things were good, great even.

Even Chad, who was usually quiet, commented on the slight bounce in Ichigo's steps recently.

Ishida couldn't help but notice their teamwork in getting rid of even more Hollows then before.

Dare say, Ichigo even had the urge to commence a mini-apocalypse by cracking a smile to replace the usual scowl on his face.

_..._

"CHANGE ME BACK!"

Forget it. The threat of fractured shins and multiple bruises-yeah, he'll take that, any day. But he would _not_ settle with his image as a chipmunk. Besides, who knew who else that deranged midget showed her drawings to? He had an image built up and-and, at least, as a bear, he had some dignity. Bears were strong and big and-and did not have abnormally puffy cheeks!

Rukia looked up from her latest manga and blankly stared up at Ichigo from the bed. Ichigo was tense, left eye twitching erratically.

She blinked twice.

Then she closed and took a deep breath. Bookmarking her page, she set aside the book and continued to move slowly, shifting into a sitting position before raising her head to regard the boy in front of her.

Too many hollows that day? The stress must have finally got to him, she thought. She was wondering when he would crack.

And so she spoke carefully and calmly as if dealing with very delicate chinaware.

"Now, Ichi….go?" The desk chair was swiveling around at a dangerous speed, devoid of an occupant. Rukia snapped her head around at the rustlings from her closet.

"H-hey! Stop rifling through my private quarters!" She shouted, pointing a finger in emphasis.

Ichigo's ears gave a twitch upon "private quarters" but he continued his search in _his_ closet. (Why she preferred to sleep there when she had a bed with Yuzu and Karin, he had no idea.) With a small "ahah!", Ichigo whipped out the familiar sketchpad and stalked over to its owner. He slapped the pad into her lap with a stern look.

Rukia flicked her gaze to her sketchpad then back up to Ichigo, eyes narrowed and demanding to hear what the meaning of all this was. Seeing Ichigo's unyielding face and crossed arms, Rukia frowned deeper and repeated her question out loud, "_What_ is the meaning of this?"

A stubborn air of challenge began to settle between the two as Ichigo straightened himself higher and repeated his command, "Change. Me. Back."

Another pause. Both glared and neither backed down.

Rukia baited Ichigo with a questioning eyebrow in spite of how they both knew precisely what Ichigo was referring to. Still fixing her defiant glare against the boy, the shinigami crossed her arms and pointedly moved her legs to stand on top of the bed (even if she still only just matched the boy's height with the extra stature boost).

Only the ticking of the clock sounded throughout the room.

Then, the shrill _beep!beep!beep!_ of the cellphone and Hollow-tracker in one sharply interrupted the two's battle of wills. Neither, however, had jumped at the sound; they had gone through the experience of many sudden Hollow alerts at any point in the day or night, their bodies now well attuned to a sixth-sense recognition even beforehand.

Rukia smoothly took out the cellphone and noted where the red dot was in her peripheral vision. Without breaking their staring contest, they spoke curtly.

"Two. Small."

"Where?"

"Willow Street."

A temporary cease-fire was silently reached and the two broke gazes at the same time and moved in practiced motion out of the window and into the night air.

_Slash!Slash!Slash!Cut!_

Their duties were executed in a surprisingly efficient manner on both parts and hardly three minutes passed before the bedroom window reopened. A tense battle, however, was still continuing between the shinigami and shinigami substitute, and without a word the two stiffly marched to their respectful beds for the rest of the night.

The morning, though, seemed to have had mellowed Ichigo out a little. Yawning and drowsily scratching his head, he headed towards the bathroom to wash up. As he brushed his teeth, the prior night's events gradually seeped into his brain. Scowling through toothpaste, his eyes flicked to his room-the closet-and he wondered how the day would turn out.

Brushing off the crumbs of his breakfast, Ichigo started for his room before pausing to glance at the full plate of food that Yuzu had put out in front of the empty chair where Rukia usually sat. Yuzu and Karin stopped eating and stared at their strange older brother, his face zipping back and forth from scowling and frowning (two very distinct expressions when it came to Ichigo) at the plate of food. His hand would start to reach for the plate before drawing back as if it were poison. Finally, Karin closed her eyes and sighed.

"Ichi-nii, just take it to her."

Ichigo seemed to consider this before his mouth decided on a scowl, and he roughly grabbed the plate before stormily marching up the stairs.

Puzzled, Yuzu turned to her sister. "Ne, nii-chan is acting so weird today."

Karin rolled her eyes and continued eating. "Male PMS probably."

Ichigo stalked into his room and turned to the closet. "Oi! Rukia! Get out here, and eat!" He pounded on the closet door and waited for her to grumpily snap it open and bark at him. He frowned when there was no response; Rukia was a light sleeper. He put an ear to the door. Silence. None of the whistling snoring (that Rukia fiercely denied to doing). Finally, Ichigo grabbed the handle and slid the door open.

And there, taped onto the back wall of the closet was a page, on it a drawn Ichigo that had been changed from chipmunk to baboon. Never mind how his flaring nostrils and stiffly bent over posture made him unintentionally imitate the crude drawing on the wall-damn it! If anything that Renji was a stupid baboon! His sword was even one!

As Ichigo briskly walked to school, his scowl slipped into a sulk. Baboons were outside the whole cute-woodsies creatures category too. In another continent. Not to mention that they had oddly colored bottoms.

So when Ichigo arrived to class he burned a glare directly at the back of Rukia's head throughout the entire day. His fellow classmates and teachers noticed the intensity, but they were hardly new to Ichigo's trademark scowling.

While Ichigo worked on the whole using his eyes to burn a hole through a shinigami head thing, he took notice of Rukia's general boredom and inattention to any of the lessons. Heh, that would be the last time he helped her with any homework. She was barely trying to take notes, she was...was that-was she doodling? Interest piqued, Ichigo straightened and casually leaned forwards to see what evil things she was drawing in that sketchpad of hers. He was able to make out a few lines or two but that was about it. He'd have to wait until lunch break.

Once the bell had rung, Rukia started to rise and put her drawings away when a hand snatched them up. She looked up in surprised and then narrowed her eyes when seeing Ichigo's gleeful smirk.

"Ichigo!" Her arm zoomed toward the pad but he raised it out of reach. Rukia cursed their damn height difference.

Meanwhile, Ichigo flipped through the sketchbook with a curious eye before stopping. There! That page! Where he had begun to have buck teeth and fur stripes. Well, he would fix this soon enough. He inwardly congratulated himself at thieving the book during school where Rukia couldn't possibly pummel him into a bloody heap without disregarding her "sweet schoolgirl" act.

While he was it, he drew stink lines around Rukia the bunny that was standing and happily holding hands with her Chappy god and Koko in some ridiculous setting with a rainbow and a setting sun. He paused to contemplate something and then drew stink lines around the other two rabbits for good measure too.

"...Heh..stupid Chappy" he muttered, satisfied. But once the last syllable of the almighty bunny god's name rolled off his tongue, Ichigo muscles automatically reacted before his mind could-hitching, bolting twenty feet away from his current spot, and stiffening into a defensive position that unfortunately looked more like a woman protecting her purse from a robber if anything. Except his purse consisted of two shin bones and an area slightly above and between his legs.

"K..Kurosaki-kun..?"

Ichigo opened his eyes and saw Inoue along with the rest of his friends staring at him, having been audience to Ichigo's sketchpad stealing and his manic erasing and drawing in it.

"..Kurosaki-kun?" Inoue started, "Are you okay?"

Ichigo warily drew back, looking past the strange looks that his friends and classmates were giving him.

Something was not right.

"Ichigo, what are you doing?" Chad questioned, seeing Ichigo suddenly scope the classroom with a new vigor. His friend was acting strange indeed. But then again, he noted, Ichigo acted differently around or because of their shinigami friend anyway.

Ichigo abruptly stood up like a petrified pin needle. He realized what was missing. The fire-breathing midget wasn't toasting him into ashes as soon as he had muttered an insult-she had vanished.

"There he is! That boy over there! He stole my notebook after I refused to let him copy down the answers to the homework we had! Even when…even when..*SNIFF* I offered to help him and tutor him everyday after school so that he could get better grades! Even when I begged for him not to skip classes so much so he that he wouldn't need much help..even when.."

It was all there. The fake, streaming tears, the overcome-with-grief swooning, the oozes of pure innocence and helplessness that shimmered around her.

Rukia The Saint with a halo. He dimly pictured a winged Kon above her, throwing fluffy crap around her.

And the principal was buying into her story of woe with teary eyes and a soggy handkerchief.

"Oh..oh Ms. Kuchiki! Do not cry no more!" The principal exclaimed. Rukia turned her bright eyes to the head of the school.

"This delinquent!-" He yanked the ear of the student by the window, and Rukia's smile faltered. "-will now be punished to the fullest extent!"

"Hey, hey! What'd I do?! Ow, man, that hurts like hell!" The unfortunate student was burst out of his head-phone world of music and dragged out of the room. Rukia almost snapped. Almost.

She quickly plastered a smile on when he turned to her with an adoring smile like that of a grandpa doting on his little granddaughter-"He will trouble you no more!"-before fixing a stern gaze at the boy wincing under the oppressive pain.

Rukia was left in the classroom, the three meter radius around her brewing with thunderclouds. Ichigo had long run off with the sketchpad; this time he was the one missing in sight.

* * *

Up on the school roof, Ichigo lazily flipped through the sketchpad. He scoffed at random doodles of rabbits and flowers, but as he looked on he realized that what he had stumbled upon was a sort of diary. In a weird, Rukia-ish way.

He paused at the plus and minus drawings with slight nostalgia, remembering when he had first seen it. Flipping back to the beginning, he followed the story that the sketchpad told. It was like a manga, he thought, one that would never win awards for artistry but clear enough in meaning.

A bunny-_Rukia_, he realized-carrying a knapsack on a stick traveled throughout soul society and survived the dangers of the lower towns and back allies. She then stumbled upon and befriended a red-haired porcupine-_hah! Porcupine!-_- and his fellow squirrels. And so the rag-tag group traveled together. There were happy times, but an increasing number of sad ones as the bunny and the porcupine lost and mourned the death of all their squirrel friends. But at the end, they looked toward a new rising sun.

The bunny with the knapsack and the porcupine with red hair traveled to an academy where they rejoiced in new clothes and plenty of food. But suddenly! A great hawk with metal feathers on his head swooped in and took the bunny away to its nest high above the ground. The porcupine sadly remained on the ground as the bunny waved goodbye from above.

Ichigo flipped the pages and skimmed through the rest. He was right in guessing that it contained her memories.

Oh, there he was. The bear with the really big sword. Ichigo sat up and looked through the remaining pages.

The bunny with the knapsack in the makeshift bear cave. The bear slicing and dicing weird swamp monster things (hollows, he guessed).

The bunny in the white tower. The bear saving the bunny.

He stopped at that page.

Oohoo, even if her drawings did suck, former-bear Ichigo sure looked grand in that cape.

Upon reaching a blank page, where Rukia must have had stopped for the moment, Ichigo considered it with a growing idea. His smile was mischievous. He would leave his mark and revel in her fury! Yeah! Ichigo: the gallant and cool tough guy bear!

Ichigo proceeded to take up a full page as he drew then added the finishing touches to his self-portrait. A proper Ichigo-bear complete with a confident smirk and a flowing cape much better than the one that she had drawn. For effect, he added a dramatic wind and a sun behind him. He brushed aside the passing thought of when he had exactly accepted himself as a bear in Rukia's world.

Ichigo sat back, taking satisfaction in his work. But after a while, his hand began moving again. His hand stopped at the page, hesitant, not really sure of what was left to draw, but he started adding an extra piece to the doodle nonetheless.

When he finished he made to go rip out the page but stopped. He left it.

Plus, if Rukia wasn't pissed already, she would have clobbered him for further damaging her sketchpad. Ichigo snuck back into the classroom during lunch break and left it on her desk. He stared at it again, the odd feeling stirring in his chest once more, but he vigorously shook his head and walked away with a scowl in place again.

Once the lunch break ended, Rukia spotted Ichigo at last and reared up with all the intent to pounce and maim-until her eye caught the sight of her sketchpad. She opened the pad, glancing at Ichigo suspiciously for having given it up so easily. But Ichigo seemed odd, flushed actually. Kind of scowling more than usual. Curious, Rukia looked through her sketchbook, suddenly self-conscious that Ichigo had looked through these pictures..these memories.

She kept shooting glances back at Ichigo, but he was glaring hard down at his desk, as if trying to solely concentrate on it. She turned back into her seat and flipped through. Soon enough, her haunches drew up at all the stink lines that had been drawn around her rabbits. How dare he meddle with her drawings! She furiously erased them, nearly erasing right through the paper.

Oh, Ichigo would pay for these, she thought. She continued to flip through the pages and go on a rampage, erasing and undoing the damage dealt by Ichigo-obtrusive graffiti and mustaches and the like.

Then, she reached the latest addition to her sketchpad. A drawing that wasn't of her own. She raised an eyebrow and scoffed at Ichigo's rendering of himself, the over-sized bear with a pompous cape seemingly mocking her from the sketchbook page. She made to distort the image with graffiti of her own but stopped at something that was scrawled on the bear.

On the bear's puffed out chest were two scraggly lumps with a pointed end in a shape that she supposed could pass for a heart. But what drew her attention was what was inside of it. After twisting her head and pondering a good deal she concluded that it was a little bunny head with a cowlick bang across its face. ...Was that her? Was she inside of this bear's heart? Rukia stilled, then slid down in her seat. Ichigo silently stared at the back of her form.

* * *

At the end of the day they were walking side by side on their way to home, each thinking. Ichigo wondered about since when he had considered Rukia to be a part of "home" and Rukia wondered since when she had considered Ichigo's house "home."

They walked in silence, between them the sketchbook in the nook of her arm.

Finally, Rukia spoke.

"..Oi, Ichigo." She watched the pebbles they passed in the road.

"…Hmm..?" Ichigo looked straight ahead.

Rukia sighed, and then took the sketchpad out of her arm. Ichigo's eyes immediately flew to it and, just as he feared, she flipped to the last page.

She needed to confirm it. Confirm what Ichigo felt.

Neither noticed that they had stopped walking. Rukia slowly turned her eyes to Ichigo's, and Ichigo turned so that they faced each other.

Rukia took another breath and held out the drawing of the gallant bear.

"In this picture you drew," she began solmenly, "I am apparently inside your stomach. Why did you eat my head?"

_Twitch._

"...Stomach...?" Ichigo repeated. "...Heart...it's a _heart-_it's a heart damn it! What are you laughing at! I can draw stuff better than you can! Who would _want_ to eat you anyway!"

Laughing still, Rukia sprinted ahead of Ichigo, throwing a challenging grin over her shoulder and making a mocking heart shape with her hands, but Ichigo was quickly catching up, fueled by her laughter as they ping-ponged insults back and forth.

What was left unsaid was established later.

On the page next to the drawing of the pompous bear (that had mysteriously acquired stink lines and a mustache), the bunny finally planted her stick in the ground of the bear cave and opened her knapsack for good.

* * *

_"What do you mean by this?"_

_" It means that you'll always have a home...here, with me."_


End file.
